CAMDEN — A man who says he is responsible for the 1979 disappearance of little Etan Patz, a crime that has haunted New York City for more than three decades, was arrested Wednesday near Camden and confessed to kidnapping and strangling the boy, according to two law enforcement sources with knowledge of the investigation.

Pedro Hernandez was tracked to Maple Shade in Burlington County on Wednesday and then grilled by NYPD detectives about his role in the infamous crime, according to the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the case. Patz vanished from his SoHo neighborhood on May 25, 1979, the first day his parents allowed him to walk to his school bus alone.

While he apparently confessed to the crime, Hernandez did not tell police why he kidnapped Patz, the sources said. He has not been charged in the child's disappearance or death.

NYPD officials have not confirmed the identity of the suspect, or how Patz died. Commissioner Ray Kelly said only that police had detained a man in connection with the boy's disappearance.

"An individual now in custody has made statements to NYPD detectives implicating himself in the disappearance and death of Etan Patz 33 years ago," Kelly said in a statement. "We expect to provide further details later today."

The sources would not say how investigators determined Hernandez was a suspect in Patz' disappearance. Hernandez was grilled for several hours during an interview at the Camden County Prosecutor's Office Wednesday, sources said, and investigators planned to take Hernandez back to the SoHo neighborhood where Patz vanished in 1979, so he could recreate the crime.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg sounded a note of caution. "There's still a lot more investigating to do," he said. "If you remember 33 years ago, this was a tragedy that broke the hearts of millions of people, especially parents, across this nation. And it’s a case that, to his credit, District Attorney Cy Vance reopened in hopes not only of bringing justice, but also offering some closure to Etan’s parents. And as a father, I just cannot imagine what they’ve gone through, and I certainly hope that we are one step closer to bringing them some measure of relief."

The Camden County Prosecutor's Office declined to comment on the specifics of the arrest. Spokesman Jason Loughlin did confirm the NYPD was in the area Wednesday, and that New York detectives used the Prosecutor's Office to conduct interviews.

Neighbor Ashley Kabbeko said her mother, Jean, saw police take away Hernandez and his wife and daughter at about 8 a.m. Wednesday. Around 2:30 p.m. she saw the detectives bring the wife and daughter, but not Hernandez, back to the house.

Maple Shade Police Chief Gary Gubbei confirmed Hernandez's arrest, and said the man was living in a duplex on East Linwood Avenue. Residents in the area were shocked to learn of Hernandez potential involvement in one of the most famous missing persons cases in the country's history.

Neighbor Jeannie Cool said Hernandez rented the rear apartment in the street's lone duplex, living there with his wife and daughter.

“They lived there like 4 or 5 years. Their daughter Becky actually went to school with my youngest son," she said. "They keep to themselves pretty much."

While she never noticed anything suspicious about the family, Cool said her daughter observed some odd behavior earlier this week.

"It was really strange, a couple of days ago they started parking their cars down around the block, a couple blocks down," she said. "And then they would walk to their house.”

The Realtor for the East Linwood Avenue property, Anne Cutry, said she rented the back apartment in the brown rental house out to a mother and daughter named Hernandez. However, the man who later moved in – at first without her knowledge – was not on the lease.

Cutry said she had heard from maintenance people who visited the property that the man in the apartment was battling cancer. She said the mother and daughter are polite, pleasant tenants – and she had never even seen the man of the family.

This morning, reporters sat outside the small brown house where Hernandez apparently lives with a wife, Rosemary, and teenage daughter. The backyard abuts a playground.

Two investigators were seen going into Hernandez's unit to talk to a woman who's home.

"They have quite a few parties. Mostly family," said Richard Hammel, one of Hernandez's neighbors. His wife, Maryanne, said they were the best neighbors in years but hadn't seen or heard anything unusual.

A woman at the home declined to comment.

Patz was declared legally dead in 2001, after the case had idled for years. His disappearance panicked New Yorkers and confounded investigators, and inspired the movement to put missing children's photos on milk cartons.

There seemed to be a break in the years-old disappearance last month, when a cadaver-sniffing dog picked up a scent in a SoHo basement that was less than a block from Patz' boyhood home. Federal and local investigators tore the property apart with jackhammers and circular saws, but ultimately found nothing.

A swarm of media stood out in the rain this morning near the Patz family's home, where residents in the now swank neighborhood said the crime still resonated with them. One woman, a 64-year-old former Cranford resident who declined to give her name, became visibly emotional as she stared at the building on Spring Street.

"I hope something comes of this once and for all. These are all our children," said the woman, who would pass by the street frequently when she worked in the neighborhood at the time. "I just hope today is the day ... it's only part closure," she said. "I mean, at least you know. But for the parents, their hearts are always broken."

"I'm hoping they find out what happened, if only for the parents," said Rosa Grazioso, 53, from Brooklyn. "It's a good thing if it turns out they got the right guy. The parents need something to say, 'OK, that's it. He can rest in peace.' That's what I wish for them."

Friday is National Missing Children's Day, which commemorates the Patz disappearance.

While Hernandez' supposed confession may bring relief to some, crime experts warned that police still need to validate his claims before officially ruling the haunting case closed. Recent media attention on the case, and the fact that Patz's body was never recovered, leave a lot of latitude to anyone seeking to take credit for the garish crime, according to Eugene O'Donnel, a former New York City police officer and district attorney

“This is a particularly difficult case because the child’s body was never found, so the guy has much more freedom to invent a narrative that you can’t easily discredit," O'Donnell said.

High publicity cases often attract a "wide array" of people who, for whatever reason, want to attach their name to a particularly iconic or heinous crime. O'Donnell said false confessions about who killed Jon Benet Ramsey, and his own experience as an intern at John Jay fielding calls from people claiming they were the "Son of Sam" killer, prompted his cause for concern.

“They’re almost convinced that they are the assailant sometimes," O'Donnell said.

The gap in time between Patz' disappearance and Hernandez' confession, and earlier claims that convicted pedophile Jose Ramos committed the crime, could also muddy the waters. O'Donnell said those situations create something of a "built-in reasonable doubt."

Ramos, who was a friend of the Patz family baby sitter, told police in 1990 that he picked up Patz the morning he vanished and tried to sexually abuse him. But he didn't kill him, and eventually sent him home on a northbound subway train near the boy's home.

Now 67, Ramos was convicted of sexually molesting two boys in 1990 and remains at a prison facility in rural Pennsylvania.

Star-Ledger staff writers Christopher Baxter and Alexi Friedman and the Associated Press contributed to this report.